12/23/2020

MS Civil Engineering
CV503 Foundation Engineering (Fall 2020)

Foundations on
Difficult Site and Soil Conditions

Mubashir Aziz, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Department of Civil Engineering,
National University of Computer & Emerging Sciences Lahore
mubashir.aziz@lhr.nu.edu.pk

Foundations on Expansive Soils

Question: What causes more Annual damage in the United States from Expansive
property damage in the United Soils (Jones and Holtz, 1973 and Jones and Jones, 1987)
States than all the earthquakes,
floods, tornados, and hurricanes
combined?

Answer: Expansive soils!

Expansive soils cause only property
damage, not loss of life!

In addition, the damages are slow and

spread over wide areas.

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NOTE:
What Causes a Clay to Expand? Clay minerals are rarely
found in a pure form.
SWELL POTENTIAL OF PURE CLAY MINERALS (Budge et al., 1964)

Bentonite (sodium montmorillonite)

is formed by chemical weathering of
volcanic ash.
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What Factors Control the Amount

of Expansion?

The swell pressure, which suppresses all

the swell resulting in no volume change.

Compacting a soil wet of the optimum and to a

lower dry unit weight reduces its swell potential.

Swell potential of compacted clays (Holtz, 1969). 4

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Influence of Climate on Expansion Potential

Thornthwaite Moisture Index (TMI) (Thornthwaite, 1948).
TMI is a function of the difference between the mean annual precipitation and the amount of water returned
to the atmosphere by evaporation and transpiration. A +TMI indicates a net surplus of soil moisture whereas
-TMI indicates a net deficit.

American Geographical Society

Depth of the Active Zone 𝐿𝐼 = (𝑤 − 𝑃𝐿)/𝑃𝐼

City Active Zone TMI

Active zone is the zone (m)
of soils that is
contributing to heave
due to soil expansion
(Nelson et al., 2001)
Active Zone in Houston USA
(O’Neill and Poormoayed, 1980)
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If the soil is not uniform with depth, or if several strata exist, the differences in soil type can be
compensated for by plotting either (w/PI) or LI rather than water content.

At depths > 20ft, the values of

w/Pl become approximately
constant. The depth of the active
zone is probably about 20ft.

IDENTIFYING, TESTING, AND EVALUATING EXPANSIVE SOILS

Correlations of swelling potential with common soil tests (Holtz, 1969 and Gibbs, 1969)

Colloids are usually defined as all particles smaller than 0.001 mm

Correlations of swelling potential with common soil tests (Chen, 1988)

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Commonly used criteria for determining swell potential

(Abduljauwad and Al-Sulaimani, 1993)

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Magnitude of Possible Swell

Oedometer tests on undisturbed/

reconstituted soil samples:
• Unrestrained swell test
• Swelling pressure test

Typical apparatus used for swell tests

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Unrestrained swell test

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Example: A soil profile has an active zone of expansive

soil of 6 ft. The liquid limit and the average moisture
content during the construction season are 45% and
20%, respectively. Determine the free surface swell.

Vijayvergiya and Ghazzalay (1973)

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Vijayvergiya and Ghazzalay (1973)

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Expansion Index (EI) Test

ASTM D4829-11 (Anderson and Lade, 1981)

• A soil specimen is remolded into a standard 4 in diameter, 1 in tall ring at a degree of saturation of
about 50 percent.
• A surcharge load of 6.9 kPa (1 psi) is applied, and then the specimen is saturated and allowed to
stand until the rate of swelling reaches a certain value or for 24 h, whichever occurs first.

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Swell Pressure Test - Conventional Consolidation Test

Free swell @
6.9 kPa (1 psi)

Zero-swell pressure (minimum contact

pressure required to avoid uplifting)

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Swell Pressure Test - Constant Volume Swell (CVS) Test

s ‘o = Effective overburden pressure

s ‘s = Anticipated surcharge caused by the foundation
Swell for layer-i s ‘1 = Additional pressure applied to prevent swelling
under s ‘o + s ‘s after addition of water

Surface heave (DS) of a foundation using CVS test

Pressure increased in
Initial small increments to
condition bring the swell to zero
(water
added)
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NOTE:
Zero swell pressure is a function of
the dry unit weight of the soil and
not of the initial moisture content

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Example:

Mid-ordinate

Mid-ordinate

DS = 1/100 * Area of Diagram

= 0.026 m = 26 mm

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Example: In previous example, if the allowable total swell is 10mm, what

would be the undercut necessary to reduce the total swell?

Total swell of 10mm is at a depth = 1.6 m

Therefore, the undercut below the foundation is 1.6 – 0.5 = 1.1 m

This soil should be excavated, replaced by nonswelling soil and recompacted.

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Foundation Considerations for Expansive Soils

1. Replacing the expansive soil under the foundation
2. Changing the nature of expansive soil
 Compact to a lower density at 3-4% above OMC
 Pre-wetting by ponding to achieve heave before construction.
 Installation of moisture barriers (about 1.5 m deep around the
perimeter of slab-on-grade type of construction)
 Chemical stabilization (lime, fly ash, RHA, etc.)
3. Strengthening the structure to withstand potential volume
changes
4. Building independent of expansive soil movements
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Construction on Expansive Soils

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In the absence of laboratory results, s’swtanf’ps may be considered

equal to cu of the clay in the active zone.

Net uplift load, Qnet = U – D (Weight of the shaft is ignored)

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Example: For the drilled shaft D.L. and L.L. are 600 and 300 kN, respectively.
The depth of active zone is 5 m with s’sw = 450 kPa. Take Nc = 6.14 and f’ps = 12o.
a) Determine the required FS against uplift. Given that Db = 1.15 m
b) Check the FS against B.C. failure assuming zero uplift force

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Foundations on Collapsible Soils

• These metastable soils are dry and strong in their natural state and quickly
consolidate upon wetting. The process of collapse is known as
hydroconsolidation, hydrocompression, or hydrocollapse.
• Most collapsible soils consist predominantly of sand and silt size particles
arranged in a loose “honeycomb” structure. This loose structure is held together
by small amounts of water- softening cementing agents, such as clay or calcium
carbonate (Barden et al., 1973).

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Collapsible Soil

• High e
• Low g

 Aeolian deposits (loess, aeolian

ab = Natural moisture state beaches, volcanic dust deposits)
bc = Collapse due to inundation  Residual soils (decomposed
granite)
Possible sources of inundation:  Soil deposited by flash floods /
• Broken water pipelines mudflows.
• Leaky sewers
• Drainage from pools/ reservoirs
• Rise in GWT
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IDENTIFICATION, SAMPLING, AND TESTING

Collapse potential and severity

 Step loads applied to an of foundation problems
(Clemence and Finbarr, 1981)
undisturbed specimen upto a
pressure of 200kPa (s’w).
 Specimen is flooded for
saturation at this pressure and
left for 24 hrs.
 The collapse potential is
calculated as:

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A loess soil that has a void ratio large enough to allow its
moisture content to exceed its liquid limit upon saturation
is susceptible to collapse (Holtz and Hilf, 1961)
Gs = 2.65
So, for collapse: w(saturated) ≥ LL

Therefore: eo ≥ LL GS (For saturated soils, eo = wGS)

The natural dry unit weight of the soil

required for its collapse is:

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Various Criteria for Identification of Collapsible Soils

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Curve drawn parallel to the specimen

at natural moisture content

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Foundation Design in Collapsible Soils not Susceptible to Wetting

Perform standard field load test to
determine the allowable soil pressure
for spread/ mat foundations

Sudden breakdown of soil

structure (more common in
soils with high wN)

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Foundation Design in Collapsible Soils

Susceptible to Wetting

1. Removal of the collapsible soil

2. Avoidance or minimization of wetting
3. Dynamic compaction
4. Chemical stabilization (Sodium silicate
solution)
5. Vibroflotation and ponding
6. Deep blasting
7. Extending foundation beyond the
zone of wetting

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